CITY OF SAN FERNANDO – A new government study has revealed that 322,622 households in Central Luzon now are considered poor.
The study was a result of the National Household Targeting System for Poverty Reduction (NHTS-PR) conducted by the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) in line with its Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) or Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino program which will add more beneficiaries next year.
DSWD regional information officer Evelyn Manalo noted that “the Central Luzon figure make up 6.13 percent of the more than five million identified indigent households nationwide.” The region now has about two million households, each having an average of five members.
Nueva Ecija posted the highest number of poverty-stricken homes in Central Luzon with 96,863 followed by Bulacan with 73,683; Pampanga-55,328; Tarlac- 46,956; Zambales- 23,804; Bataan- 16,655 and Aurora-9,333.
A household is a social unit consisting of a person or a group of persons who sleep in the same housing unit and have a common arrangement in the preparation and consumption of food, Manalo said.
The study also revealed that 52.89 percent of the recorded poor households in the region live in rural areas while 47.11 percent live in urban areas.
“In terms of education, 26.22 percent of the identified school age poor household members are not attending school. Non-school attendance rate in school age brackets reflects 9.22 percent for 3-5 years old, 21.37 percent for 6-12 years old, 21.12 percent for 13-16 years old, and 61.43 percent for 17-24 years old,” Manalo said.
The study also revealed that 57 percent of the enlisted poor household members aged 15 years old and above are unemployed while 26.07 percent are laborers and unskilled workers.
It also disclosed that 4.5 percent of the identified indigent homes belong to indigenous peoples with Zambales garnering the highest number at 5,708. Some 3.6 percent of these homes have household members aged 60 years old and above.
Manalo said that the “NHTS-PR is an information management system that identifies who and where the poor are in the country. It uses the Proxy Means Test (PMT) in the selection of beneficiaries for social welfare programs and services.”
“The PMT is a statistical model that estimates household income using proxy variables included in the household assessment form (HAF).
Some of the variables used in the PMT are family composition, education of household members, housing conditions and access to basic services. These variables were sourced out from the Family Income and Expenditure Survey (FIES) and Labor Force Survey (LFS) of the National Statistics Office,” Manalo said.
She noted that “a household whose economic condition falls on or below the poverty line would qualify for the specific programs and services of DSWD such as the Pantawid Pamilya, Self Employment Assistance-Kaunlaran (SEA-K), Social Pension and Cash for work.”
The CCT program provides cash grants of P1,400 per month during school months (June-March) and P500 per month during non-school months (April-May) to household beneficiaries as long as they comply with certain conditions like the regular visit of children in health centers to avail immunization and maintenance of a class attendance rate of at least 85 percent per month for those who are enrolled in day care centers or schools.
Manalo said that SEA-K, on the other hand, is a capability building program that seeks to enhance the skills of poor families through the organization of community-based associations for entrepreneurial development.
She explained that the Social Pension program provides a monthly stipend of P500 to indigent Senior Citizens aged 77 years old and above who are not receiving any pension, without any permanent source of income and have no regular support from relatives.
Cash for Work recipients work on identified community projects for 11 days which earn them P3,146 or P286 per day.
Among the projects beneficiaries work on include river dredging and embankment, repair of small scale irrigation and tree planting and other reforestation activities.
